Magnotta avoided certain topics with psychiatrist in Berlin prison

The psychiatrist who met with Luka Magnotta during his week in the Berlin prison hospital said his patient didn't want to talk about certain topics, including having sex with his stepmother when he was 16. He didn't talk about killing and dismembering Lin Jun either. "Many psychotic patients don't talk about their crime at all," psychiatrist Thomas Barth told Magnotta's first-degree murder trial Wednesday.

The psychiatrist who treated Luka Magnotta for a week in a Berlin prison hospital believes the man who killed and dismembered Concordia University student Lin Jun wasn’t pretending to be sick in order to escape criminal charges.

Under severe questioning Wednesday by Crown prosecutor Louis Bouthillier, Thomas Barth held his ground and said the patient he met and spoke with for seven days in June 2012 was not faking a psychiatric illness.

But Bouthillier referred to a behaviour called malingering, found in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the Bible for psychiatrists.

“Malingerers intentionally and purposefully feign illness to achieve some recognizable goal,” Bouthillier read. “They may wish to get drugs, win a lawsuit, or avoid work or military service. At times the deceit of the malingerer may be readily apparent to the physician; however, medically sophisticated malingerers have been known to deceive even the best of diagnosticians.

“He wanted you to believe he was crazy,” Bouthillier told Barth during the witness’ second day testifying for the defence. “He wanted the world to believe he was crazy.”

“I don’t use the word crazy,” Barth replied. “He was very ill in Berlin.”

“Who are we to believe and when Dr. Barth?” Bouthillier asked.

“I’m not here to give my opinion,” Barth replied. “But I believed Magnotta in June 2012.”

“Is it possible he was using you to record his symptoms so there would be a record of them?” Bouthillier asked.

“I’m aware some try to fake symptoms and I knew this was an important case,” Barth replied. “But I didn’t have a moment of suspicion, nor did others.”

Bouthillier is hoping the 48 witnesses he called during 19 days of testimony will convince the jury that Magnotta planned the May 25, 2012, killing, deliberately mailed Lin’s body parts to Vancouver and Ottawa, then fled the country to Europe the following evening.

The Crown prosecutor pointed out that Magnotta was seen at the Jewish General Hospital two months before the killing, but didn’t tell doctors he was having schizophrenic symptoms.

The psychiatrist at the hospital wrote that Magnotta didn’t appear to be suffering from bipolar disorder or psychosis.

“I wouldn’t be surprised if that was the case even a day before I saw him,” Barth replied. “Schizophrenics can appear normal and then a little change in their lives can lead to a relapse and a psychotic outbreak.”

“Are you aware Mr. Magnotta worked as an actor?” Bouthillier asked as his final question in cross examination.

“No, I didn’t know that,” Barth replied.

Sketch of Luka Rocco Magnotta at his first-degree murder trial in Montreal.Postmedia Wire

Magnotta, 32, brought Lin to Magnotta’s Décarie Blvd. apartment around 10 p.m. on May 24, 2012. He has admitted to stabbing and cutting him several times, and severing his body into 10 pieces. Police retrieved videos of the vicious attack on Magnotta’s camera and an edited video was discovered posted online. But his defence is that he should be found not criminally responsible because his mental state at the time prevented him from grasping the true nature of his acts.

It wasn’t Barth’s job to make that assessment and he never even spoke to Magnotta about his crimes, he said.

“Many psychotic patients don’t talk about their crimes at all,” he said. “Often they can’t remember or they just don’t want to.”

Bouthillier pointed out that Magnotta told Barth that he had been taking medication but must have left it in his suitcase that was in Frank Rubert’s apartment — a man Magnotta had met on an online dating site and stayed with in Berlin.

But when police searched the apartment, they didn’t find any medication, the Crown said.

Bouthillier wanted to know if Barth asked Magnotta more about the sex videos that he claimed he was forced to make. Barth said he didn’t ask because he knew a lot of psychotics on the streets of Berlin who did the same thing in order to make money.

“What about the videos with animals?” Bouthillier asked.

“I never heard of pornography with animals,” the psychiatrist replied.

Renée Roy, Magnotta’s current psychiatrist who began her testimony Monday, returned to the stand once Barth was finished.

She said Magnotta co-operated with her but she noticed that he didn’t always shower.

“He said he was afraid of being sexually assaulted,” she said. “He showed me his cell and it was very dirty.”

She said he began taking French and History courses but dropped them because he found it difficult to concentrate, and was hearing noises as if there was a cellphone in his head.

“And when he started going to court, he felt the attitude of the staff toward him had changed,” Roy said.

The trial continues Thursday with the Crown’s cross examination of Roy.

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